


Taken

by mjonesing (klassmartin)



Series: Sixty Minutes Challenge [1]
Category: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, F/M, Future Fic, Kidnapping, Ned Leeds is a Good Bro, Now updated to include:, Patricia the overeager drone, The real otp of this story is MJ and Peter’s numerous gadgets and gizmos, don’t fuck with a girl’s jeans, is angsty fluff a thing, karen + MJ 4eva, michelle is so soft for peter, mj is done, okay I’m done now you may proceed, peter continues to lose his mind, peter is a goddamn mess, superhuman disaster peter parker, the marvel that is Michelle Jones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-09-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:55:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24589441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/klassmartin/pseuds/mjonesing
Summary: "Hey, Peter."He whirls around at the sound of her voice, and there she is, smiling down at him with her favourite mug warming her hands.“If you’re watching this, then that means I’ve been taken.”(Now with extra angst!)
Relationships: Michelle Jones/Peter Parker
Series: Sixty Minutes Challenge [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1777423
Comments: 81
Kudos: 124





	1. Taken 1: Not Totally Gone

**Author's Note:**

> whoops I did a thing
> 
> I’ve been writing a lot in this quarantine, getting lost in plot and a world where everything can make sense because I make it that way. I’ve got a couple of story options going for spideychelle week, all of then between 50-70% done, but I’ve struggling with them recently and I think I’m just too far in my own head about it, obsessing over characterisation and the details and if it’s good enough.
> 
> So I decided to set myself a challenge. Every time I’m struggling or need something creative to do, I’m going to find a random prompt or object or something that inspires me, and when I have a vague idea for the scene, set a timer for one hour. And just go with it. Write whatever my brain decides to get out and see what happens. When the timers done it’s pencils down. Only minor editing of spelling or grammar is allowed. And then I post it, so it’s out in the world and out of my head!  
> For my first go, it worked pretty well. About halfway through my brain started considering what would come next and I had to refocus, but I’m not against returning to this little universe if the right prompt sparks something.  
> Phew okay that was a lot! On with the story.

_“I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine,  
And rage the likes of which you would not believe.  
If I cannot satisfy one,  
I will indulge the [other](https://defiantbritta.tumblr.com/post/130505477084/there-is-something-at-work-in-my-soul-which-I-do).”_

  
"Hey, Peter."

He whirls around at the sound of her voice, and there she is, smiling down at him with her favourite mug warming her hands.

“If you’re watching this, then that means I’ve been taken.” 

Peter can't breathe with the sight of her, reaching out to touch the projection on the bathroom wall. She looks a little younger than the Michelle he knows now, her old bedroom at her parent's house the backdrop to the sincerity in her eyes, a little unsure, pulling her knees up to her chin as she collects herself.

"I don't know where in time you are; I like to think I'll make a new one of these in a few years, when I'm less of an awkward teenager and… more of an awkward adult." She chuckles under her breath. "But to give you some perspective; it's 2024 right now, and you just told me you loved me for the first time."

Four years. He can remember the day so clearly; how he'd made this grand and ridiculous plan to tell her - like his plans ever get to actually happen - and then he'd been side-tracked stopping the Green Goblin from flattening Manhattan. When the battle was over, he'd fallen through her window, broken and bleeding and desperate to see her, and he'd blurted it out right before collapsing into her arms.

Michelle looks over her shoulder and he realises, then, that there's a boy in her bed, a ruined suit and bloodied gauze discarded on the floor.

"You decided to take a nap before I could say it back, but I'm going to." Michelle bites her lip as she smiles, looking shyly into her tea. She looks back into the camera, her amusement gone. "And I do, Peter. I do, _so_ much. I don't want to say it to you now when I haven't said it to you here, but I do."

Peter wipes furiously at the tears running down his face. "I love you too," he whispers to her, even though she can't hear him. Perhaps she'll feel it, wherever she is right now.

"I'm scared, Peter," she admits, her eyes wet. "You were in a bad way when you turned up here. I don't think I've seen you this beaten up… Ever. It was even worse that London. I watched it on the news and you were… You were _angry_ , and Ned told me what happened. He told me why."

Michelle takes a breath to steady herself, looking up at her ceiling like she always does when she's about to cry. "You thought I was still there, Peter. You were trying to save me."

He will always save her. He will always protect her. Michelle is everything to him and you don't stop trying, _ever_ , to take care of the people you love.

He loves her, and that's why his knuckles are bleeding, why May is tending to Rhodey's wounds, why he's even in this bathroom to begin with. Trying to pull himself together so he can focus on finding her.

"I realised that that's probably only going to get worse, as our relationship continues. I think loving me will make you reckless, and that if something happens to me, there won't be anyone capable of stopping you."

Michelle puts down her legs and her mug and leans closer, her dark eyes piercing through him like she's really there.

"So I'm making you this video and giving it to E.D.I.T.H. for when you need it. And I hope you're paying attention, because I'm only saying this once."

Peter nods. "I'm listening," he promises.

"Do not lose yourself for me," she says firmly. "Whatever is happening to me right now, I know you will find me. I trust you implicitly with my life. But you have to be smart; use your brains, not your fists. Let your friends help you. You need to control yourself until I can flick you on the ear and do it myself."

Michelle grimaces and her hands comes up to the camera, like she wants to reach right through it and touch his face. He wishes she could; he misses her touch. He misses her.

"I don't want Spiderman to save me if he's not Peter Parker anymore."

She sighs, tilting her head before shaking it. She picks up her tea and takes a sip; he can tell from the colour it's the lavender tea she used to be obsessed with. "This feels so weird, talking to a future you while I'm waiting for present you to heal. I kinda wish I could see you, but then… No. I don't need a glimpse into our future right now, especially if I'm really missing."

The other Peter groans behind her and she spins around in her chair, skidding across the floor with the wheels. Her hand strokes down his arm and along his jaw, and she leans close to press her lips to his forehead. When she comes back to the desk, she looks down, typing something on her phone.

Finally, Michelle looks back into the camera. "I have to go, but know that everything's going to be okay - and wipe those tears away, Parker. You've got things to do. I'll see you on the other side."

The video ends, and Peter runs his hands through his hair, the panic from before slowly beginning to grow again in his chest. "E.D.I.T.H.," he calls desperately. "Play it again."


	2. Taken 2: Enter Patricia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oops I made this a multi-chap.
> 
> I’ve actually finished all four parts so I’ll post them with some kind of speed. Each one followed the rules of the challenge, and I can’t believe I actually dragged a semi decent plot out of what was just MJ making a video.

The last thing he remembers is seeing a blood stain on the concrete floor. 

Rage pulsing through his veins. Then nothing.

Peter blinks and the kindest eyes in the universe shine back at him. 

He’s crying. Why is he crying?

“I’m so sorry. I’m sorry. May, please you have to forgive me!”

His whole body is trembling on the bathroom floor, and when he looks down on himself, his hands are stained red. 

Oh God. No, please, no.

“Peter, it’s okay, I just need you to breathe. Breathe, sweetie.”

What has he done?

“I just want her back. I need her back.”

Who? What's going on?

And then it comes back to him, in bits and pieces and then all at once.

Coming home to an upended apartment - the broken chair, the shattered glass, the kitchen knife and the smears of blood. His desperate search coming up empty. The calls to May and Ned, the hospitals and her family, the Avengers. She'd managed to set off the distress beacon but there was no way to trace her; they were good, knew all about the emergency tracker in her vibranium bracelet, how to disable the cameras no one was supposed to know about.

He remembers the image that had cropped up on the server; Michelle, bruised and bleeding and furious, a gun pressed to her temple. The countdown. The demands.

He was all in. Fuck everyone else if it meant saving her.

He'll never forget the way Rhodes had looked at him. "There has to be another way. I know you love her, Pete, but no one person is worth the amount of devastation this would cause to thousands of people."

_I don't want Spiderman to save me if he's not Peter Parker anymore._

The lead. The fury when it didn't pan out. The second lead. The man that had greeted them with an envelope and a warning.

His fist colliding with bone. Over and over again.

It's been three days and there's already blood on his hands.

It's been three days and he's already become her worst nightmare.

May moves away from him, reaching for something he can't see. He scrambles desperately across the wet tiles.

"No please, please don't go," he begs, trying to grasp her hand; her arm; anything to keep her here. "Please don't leave me, not you too."

"It's okay, I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere." She curls around his trembling frame, rocking him back and forth the way she used to when he was little, his head full of terrible images as he cried for the parents he would never see again.

"I'll be good," he sobs, "I'll be good just please, don't go."

May holds him tighter, whispering a broken apology before the world goes black.

* * *

The next time his eyes open, it's to the furrowed brow of his best friend.

"Ned?" Peter inhales sharply against the fog clouding his brain. "What's - Where am I?"

Discarding his laptop in one careless move, Ned scoots further up the bed to grab Peter's hand. "Hey, buddy. You're okay. You just have to stay calm for me so they don't bring the needles out again."

Peter squeezes Ned's fingers, the panic flaring back to life as he remembers the trail of blood from Michelle's temple that pooled in the divot of her collarbone. "MJ? She's really gone?"

"Not for long." Ned's mouth is set in a firm line, the deep shadows under his eyes revealing what Peter hasn't had the capacity to notice; that he's not the only one affected by this, that he's not alone in his anguish. "We're going to find her, Peter. We're going to bring her home - and I might know how."

Peter pales, heart in his throat as he waits for the punchline. Ned nods a gentle assurance. "Ned, don't… Are you sure? You have to be sure. I don't think I can cope with another setback."

"I couldn't be sure until you woke up." Ned drags the laptop back towards him, fingers tapping away on the keys before twisting it to show Peter images of his apartment. "Do you remember the night before? You called me for advice."

Peter scratches his forehead as he thinks back. He'd been trying to work through a problem, barely feeling the passing of time until Ned had answered the phone with a groggy, "What's up?" The call had gone on for over an hour, until MJ had trudged into the kitchen with pillow creases on her cheek. She'd plucked the tools out of his hands and fallen heavily into his lap, face nuzzling into his neck.

"It's 4am. Come to bed." 

"I'm nearly done," he'd promised, curling an arm around her waist as she relaxed into him. "Just a technical hiccup with the cloaking. Ned's helping me out."

"Ned would also like to go to bed," their friend had added through the phone speaker.

"See? We all agree." He'd tried to reach for his tools but she'd slapped at his wrist with the precision of someone far more awake than she was. "Bedtime for everyone - Say, 'Goodnight, Ned.'" 

"Goodnight, Ned," the two boys had chorused. He'd felt the eye roll against his skin.

He'd carried her back to bed and pulled her tight to his chest, kissing lazily down the nape of her neck until she'd moaned his name, reminding him of her early start and her need for rest. Shortly after, her breath evened out and the steady beat of her heart lulled him to sleep.

It's the last time he'd seen her. He'd woken up alone the next morning, and by the end of his work day, the distress beacon was alerting him to the events that would eventually lead him here, staring at Ned like he'd grown another head.

"I don't understand," Peter says to Ned as he pours over the image, trying to find what's sparking in Ned's eyes when he'd searched the room itself a hundred times.

"Look at the table." Ned leans closer, zooming in and pointing at the mess of wires and tools. "What's missing?"

Comprehension dawns on Peter. "It's gone."

"Either the kidnappers fancied a barely functioning prototype, or -"

"She took it. MJ took Droney Jr." Peter sniffs against the fresh wave of tears that spill down his cheeks. "Fuck, I love her so much."

"Are you even surprised? We've always known she's the smartest person in the universe." Peter manages a grimace in response to Ned's quirked smile. Ned pulls the laptop back towards him, typing away as he mutters to himself. "How did she even manage it? I know it's small but surely they'd spot her holding a drone - did you even finish the cloaking in the end?"

"I had some time before I went to work, but it wouldn't matter - Patricia was still programmed to her bracelet from the initial testing. It followed her everywhere, she hated it." Ned glances up in confusion. "She gave it a name. Secretly, I think she got attached - kept asking it to fetch the remote or the mail."

Ned slumps. "I can't find it in Karen's network."

Peter gestures for him to hand over the laptop, an idea beginning to take shape. "Patricia isn't on Karen's network yet, but I did loop it into Edith's for a recon programme I've been working on. With a little luck… There!" Peter points excitedly at the monitor. "There's a signal!"

"Are you serious? We found her?!" Ned whoops for joy, embracing Peter as happier tears chase away the sad. "MJ is coming home!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is a ‘meanwhile, with MJ...’ chapter that I wrote about thirty seconds after posting the first chapter I missed her in this one.
> 
> @mjonesing on Tumblr as always


	3. Taken 3: MJ’s Revenge

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I watch one too many action movies before writing this? Yes. Will you be able to tell? Yes. Do I think it’s hilarious and therefore probably accurate? Definitely.

Michelle is bored.

It's probably the wrong attitude to have when one is kidnapped, but forgive her. It's only her first time. She doesn't know the rules or expectations yet.

The first guys had sucked. They were the ones to take her, so she might have a slight bias, but her head still hurts from where they'd knocked her out and now there's a blood stain all over her favourite pair of jeans. 

Fuck them, quite frankly. 

When she'd first arrived in this cold, damp shitbag of a place, they'd strapped her to this chair and pushed her around and asked stupid questions she was never going to answer. One even told her to smile for the camera. 

It took hours for them to leave her alone.

The second lot were okay, by comparison. Sure, they dragged her into that van after some very panicked and ill-advised resistance - she knows the odds of coming back from a secondary location, she’s watched John Mulaney’s special - but when she got there the chair was at least a little more comfortable. A tall, skinny guy even bought her some cloudy water and a bowl of pasta. That was somewhat decent; taking her basic needs into consideration. 

She hadn't touched any of it, but she could tell it was cold. And there was no way she’d  _ actually  _ eat it. When one of them tried to force her to, she spat in his face. 

After him someone came in and tried to get her talking, so clearly they don't know much about her. He didn't exact much violence other than a backhand to the face, which was preferable to the third lot.

There's one staring at her from a seat opposite. Another is pulling her hair. Someone else has a knife to her throat.

It’s doing nothing for the crick in her neck from sleeping upright. Maybe if he tugged a little harder and to the left -

"I don't want to hurt you," the guy in the chair says, fingers toying with the end of his jet black braid that she dreamed last night of shoving down his throat. "Just tell us what we need to know."

Michelle stares at the ceiling, trailing her eyes over the support beams. If she squints, she can just make out the ripple of a partially cloaked drone.

"If you don't start talking, that little bug boy you consider your boyfriend is gonna when he gets our little message."

She gasps overdramatically, closing her eyes in lieu of throwing back her head. “Oh, fear clutches at my breast!”

“…did you just quote space jam?” the guy with the knife asks, his deep voice full of confusion and a touch of humour.

She shrugs the best she can in her strained position. “I watched it last week.”

Her annoy-them-into-going plan works; soon the group leave, and she can continue phase 3.

“Patricia, hurry up!” she whispers, and the soft hum of a motor whirring towards her allows her to relax once more. Despite all her protests to be Peter’s test dummy for the little pest, she’s never been more thankful than the moment she woke up alone in that first room to hear it hovering above her head. It’s the only assurance she can rely on, the only tangible proof that help is on the way. All she has to do is wait it out. 

Peter will come for her. There has never been a second of doubt on that. At least this way, hopefully, he’ll know where to look.

“The ropes,” she hisses, trying to keep her voice down. Patricia moves around her until the waft of air concentrates around her wrists, the blades becoming almost too loud for comfort as they work on cutting through.

“Did you send out the signal?” she asks under her breath, even though she knows the drone can’t respond. “Those boys better have their heads screwed on right. If they don’t check Edith… No. It’s fine. Between them, they’re capable of a clever thought.”

Patricia whines. It sounds doubtful.

“Oh shut up, what do you know? You’re just a nice collection of wires and circuits.”

The doors rattle.

“Go!” she orders, just as the chair guy waltzes back into the room with a toolbox. She swallows nervously but carefully schools her expression into casual indifference, testing her restraints when he’s facing her fully.

There’s a little bit of give, but surely not enough.

“Hello again,” she says through an affected yawn. 

“It won’t be long now,” he says softly; as though he cares, as though he’s sorry for what they’ve done to her. “My sources assure me the ransom will soon be paid in full, and you will be able to return to your pitiful little life.”

Michelle’s exhale trembles. 

The Avengers would never; one life in exchange for thousands is never a price worth paying.

But Peter? She can’t be so sure. 

Something gives, tearing into the raw skin of her wrist. She almost smiles. 

“I’m glad you find this all so amusing.” He pulls out a knife from his belt, tracing a finger over the curved blade like a lover. “A pity it took so long. I won’t be able to return you in one piece now.”

She’s barely listening; staring at the ceiling as she finally takes her first unencumbered breath. 

He fists the tatters of her ponytail and yanks back so hard she can’t help but cry out. The blade dances across the heated skin on her cheek.

She sees red. The most beautiful ruby shade of light.

She sighs.

The man smacks her across the face, her head whipping to the side as her lip splits apart. She laughs, a haunting laugh full of the anger that suddenly catches fire within her gut. "Oh, you stupid little man. You really don't get it, do you? You've fucked with the wrong person."

He scoffs. "What, Spiderman?"

"No." She shakes her head with a predatory smile. "Me."

The rope binding her hands snaps.

"You think kidnapping me -  _ torturing _ me - is gonna make him lose him shit? You're right. See, he won't stop until he finds me; he'll search every corner, under every rock in the whole universe and beyond. Peter  _ loves _ me, and he is so goddamn protective over the people he loves. It's why he's so hellbent on protecting the city.” 

A thud from outside, but the man keeps his gaze on her, like her sudden confidence has fixed him to the spot.

“But what you haven't accounted for is that I'm the same. Peter protects everything, but  _ I  _ am the one who protects  _ him _ . So do your worst; really, go for it. Hurt me all you want. Just know that when he does find me, the hell he will rain down on you is a drop in the well compared to what I'm gonna do after."

He steps closer,leaning down until his braid grazes the torn fabric of her shirt. "You? What is a skinny little girl like you going to do?"

"This." 

In one swift move, she grabs his face and throws it straight down into the upward swing of her knee. She hears the crack of bones breaking and his pained yell fuels her out of her seat, her bare foot meeting his larynx hard enough to keep him on the floor. 

"You really think I've been in a relationship with Spiderman for this long without knowing how to defend myself?" She grabs the knife from where he’s dropped it just out of reach, twirling it around her fingers with a pleased hum. “Gym memberships are expensive; I prefer to hang out with my boyfriend. This? I learnt from cooking classes with my best friend.”

The blade lodged right between his second and third metacarpals, pinning his hand to the concrete floor with a scream. 

“That was for my jeans!”

The noises outside increase, violent and hopeful. She grabs the chair, smashing it against the floor until she has a reasonable enough weapon.

The door bursts open, ricocheting off the wall.

Michelle smirks. 

She’s ready.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MJ is my queen. Nobody kidnaps her (or ruins her jeans) and gets away with it.
> 
> @mjonesing on Tumblr as always.


	4. Taken 4: Adrenaline’s Influence

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This definitely took a little longer than an hour but can you blame me for wanting to end it right.
> 
> Thank you for all your support on this one - what started off as a silly, angsty, tiny idea accidentally grew into this four part mess that’s not quite cohesive but I love all the same. 
> 
> It’s 2am on a Thursday night and I woke up with a need to post this. Hopefully it finds you well <3

Sam tries to tell him to stay in the van. Nearly everyone agrees.

For obvious reasons, Peter does not. Neither does Ned, though he’s biased. When he tries to argue, he gets that look that reminds him of his Uncle Ben when he’d whine, “Five more minutes!” because he wanted to finish putting the toaster back together before dinner; of Tony Stark telling him to stay behind and then finding out he hadn’t listened; and most significantly, the look Aunt May fixes him with every time he ends up on the news for the wrong reasons. It makes him feel like a child, which is ridiculous, because he hasn’t been a child for years. 

He still stamps his foot in protest. He almost thinks it works, too, until he realises Wanda is lurking behind him.

“He comes with,” she says, her voice hollow from the losses she’s spent years trying to overcome. 

It’s nice that someone has his back, that he doesn’t have to sneak out and do it himself - it's not like he  _ had _ to disclose the new information to them - but he respects them, maybe even trusts them enough to carry this off without a hitch. 

He thanks her with a smile. She nods and the discussion is promptly closed. 

They make a plan in record time, mostly hurried by Peter’s slow and anxious retreat to the door. The journey is short - she’s been so close all this time, barely even out of state - and before the plane has finished touching down, Peter is suited up and out the cargo door. 

There are a lot of guys inside. If he weren’t so efficiently taking them down, he’d be impressed - there’s no quantity of people large enough to stop him or the Avengers that handle anyone who dares to slip past him - so he thinks, perhaps, it would be funny if it required this many to keep Michelle  _ in _ . 

“Leave some for the rest of us,” Scott jokes weakly, but it’s background noise to the steady  _ thwip _ and  _ clash _ of his practised offensive. 

“Don’t listen to him - you’re doing great,” Ned croons into his ear. “Each hit is another step closer to our girl.”

Somehow he works a little harder after that.

Droney scouts the rest of the building ahead of them, following the trail of its potential successor. Peter watches the live feed through his display as he fights, and when Droney hits the roadblock of a thick, guarded door, Peter almost takes a punch to the ribs in all his unbridled excitement. 

“There are sounds of a struggle from inside, Peter,” Karen tells him. He knows she’s only an A.I., but she somehow sounds concerned - like all the time Michelle has spent chatting to her over the years has formed a genuine bond above the programming. 

“Go! We’ve got things handled out here!” Sam yells over the pained grunt of his latest victory. 

He doesn’t need telling twice. 

Peter runs. 

Taking the last man down is embarrassingly easy - a well angled web, a sharp tug, and the guy’s lost his battle with gravity. As Peter rushes past, he aims a taser web at his crotch - the least he deserves, but he has more important things to focus on. 

Someone screams from inside.

Peter kicks down the door, dirt and soil billowing into the air so he has to squint to see, running into the room like time is about to run out. 

(Maybe it is. What if he’s too late? Can he handle another setback? Or worse… If she’s gone and he can’t get her back? How does he survive that?)

He comes to an abrupt stop when the cloud disperses.

Standing in the middle of the room, chest heaving with exertion, is Michelle. The remnants of a chair hover over one shoulder, a body knocked out cold at her feet. She's dirty, sweaty and covered in dried blood, her hair matted against her forehead and neck. Some of the blood has stained her jeans. She'll probably be really mad about that.

She's  _ beautiful _ . He whimpers just at the sight.

"Oh, hey Peter." She drops the chair to the ground and wipes the back of her hand over her lips. "Thanks for the rescue."

“MJ?” he stutters out. “It’s really you?”

“Of course it’s me, dork.” Her dark eyes settle on him, a smile slowly lighting up her face. It takes his breath away. 

"And you're okay?" he asks, voice broken.

"Yeah, I’m always okay. You?"

"I've been better."

"That's fair." She sighs, long and loud. Her hands tremble at her side, betraying the lopsided grin she flashes him. "Are you just going to stand there or -"

Peter throws himself across the ten feet between them, crashing into her body so hard they almost topple over. She's ready for him; every limb wraps around him with all the strength she has left, tears leaking down both their faces, intertwining like they too have missed each other. He strokes his hands over her hair, her back, her ribs - trying to feel for the injuries that Karen is already informing him of. Michelle must hear her because huffs out a laugh and tugs at his mask until she can reach his lips with her own.

Michelle kisses him desperately, with  _ everything _ , fingers splayed over his cheeks as she keeps him close. He's too relieved to do anything but kiss her back. It’s like the joining of their mouths has finally, fully convinced him this is real - Michelle is here and safe and back in his arms, his world can now continue turning.

He missed her so much that it was a physical ache. Now she's here, pressed tight against him, and he can finally breathe again.

"I love you," he mumbles between kisses, and, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," and even a, “I’m never letting you go.”

"It's okay," she tells him every time. "I love you too."

Eventually she withdraws enough to tug off the mask completely, kissing him softly before travelling across his nose, his cheeks, his forehead. He preens at her heightened levels of affection, so consumed with it that he barely notices her stop to really take him in.

“Peter,” she breathes, a praise and a scolding all at once, brushing her thumb under his eye where he knows the strain of her disappearance shows most. Her fingers card through the unwashed mess of his hair. Should he have remembered to figure out the last time he showered before seeing her again? It seems an unfathomable thought, yet the concern in her gaze - like she hasn’t just survived a kidnapping, or that she’s wondering who fared better with their separation - is mirrored only by his own as his fingers trace over the mottling of bruises he knows he’ll find later.

“I love you,” she says again, sure and content. 

“I love you, too. Fuck, MJ… I love you so much.”

Michelle squeezes her legs tighter around him and nuzzles their noses together. Perhaps she too has missed breathing the same air as him. Maybe he’s not the only one who’s craved the strange little things he hadn’t known were important until they were gone.

Their eyes meet across the slither of space still remaining between them. Peter’s hands still roam across her spine, counting every vertebrae like she’ll disappear again if he stops. When he reaches her neck, he realises she’s stopped breathing.

Peter leans forward and kisses her with a learnt ease that comes from years together, his stomach full of butterflies at the feel of her melting into his chest, any residual tension escaping her like a wounded balloon. 

“Is that Ned I can hear screaming?” she asks in amusement when she pulls back. Sure enough, Ned’s celebration floods back into his ears as the soft tint she brought back to his world expands to include something other than just the two of them.

“He’s missed you as well. I’m sure he’ll tell you himself when he’s capable of something more than creating sound above the human range of hearing.”

“I missed you too, Ned. I hope we get a refund on our missed class yesterday,” Michelle says into Peter’s ear, but it only serves to make his hormones go crazy at the mere hint of teeth that graze over the sensitive skin of his ear lobe.

Peter’s hand squeezes her upper thigh. She giggles breathlessly. 

Sam Wilson clears his throat behind them. "I don't mean to interrupt, but… Shall we wrap this whole thing up? Get the bad guys in the van and head out?"

"That sounds like a great idea." Michelle kisses the tip of Peter's nose and caresses his cheek with muddied fingers. "Let's go home, Peter."

He nods, even though he's already home.

With her head nestled against his shoulder, Peter carries her out of the room and back to their happy corner of the world. 

"I think we should get married."

"I was just thinking that! Let's go right now."

"Hospital first. Then the courthouse."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know your thoughts! I couldn’t resist the ending - I’ve had that in my mind since I first decided to write a follow up.
> 
> @mjonesing on Tumblr as always.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Let me know what you thought. If you fancy suggesting anything for my next challenge, or just fancy a chat, I’m mjonesing on tumblr


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